Draft scheme is just planning for disaster

Bill HoffmanWhether taking on developers hell-bent on destroying the Coast’s natural appeal or a Prime Minister indifferent to the plight of the poor, Bill Hoffman has never been one to mince his words. Bill’s been a journalist for 32 years, 29 of those on the Coast. Love him or hate him, he'll get you blogging.

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THE clear message flowing from the latest UN climate change talks in Doha is that adaptation is the sole pathway to maintaining any control over future safety and to stave off crippling economic chaos.

Temperature increases in the order of four to six degrees by 2100 will unleash massive amounts of additional energy causing more frequent and intense weather events be they fire, flood, drought, cyclone or the inevitability of storm surges swamping our coastline.

By as early as 2060 - only 48 years from now - we will have entered a very different world.

There is no longer any doubt about the science. The only remaining argument is about the severity of the impacts.

The first regional Sunshine Coast planning scheme which will set the dial for that future here is pure folly.

It is a scheme so conflicted that even Clive Palmer's fanciful plans get a mention, as if they have some place in the scheme of things.

The University Hospital on the highly vulnerable Kawana flood plain, the planned Maroochydore CBD and airport redevelopments represent multi-billion-dollar long-term investments that are all taking place or are planned to be located in areas of high vulnerability.

The multi-billion light rail system, planning for which is being funded by ratepayers, would be financially dependent on massively increased population densities in the last places it should be contemplated they be put.

There is nothing adaptive about these so-called economic drivers.

They will prove in the near future to be burdens created by policy that ignored available knowledge.

The planning scheme caters for a population pushed to increase by another 180,000 people between now and 2031.

That growth has no place anywhere near a coastal flood plain that now represent risk rather than opportunity.

The University of the Sunshine Coast is home to a robust climate change adaptation research unit, working in collaborative partnership with the cutting edge of climate change science globally.

If we truly aspired to be an Australian model for sustainability, its findings and expertise should have been central to the creation of the Sunshine Coast Regional Planning Scheme.

It is well past time to act.

A local authority may not be able to influence a global response to climate change, but through example it remains possible to set adaptation standards and to develop expertise that would create real economic opportunity for this region.